


Zebra3 Tea Shoppe

by rosa_himmelblau



Category: Starsky & Hutch
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-04
Updated: 2020-11-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:35:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27388819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosa_himmelblau/pseuds/rosa_himmelblau
Summary: Is a tea shop the best place to find true love?
Comments: 13
Kudos: 20





	Zebra3 Tea Shoppe

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Martha J Bonds (April_Valentine)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/April_Valentine/gifts).



Dave Starsky was sad. 

He hadn’t been crazy about working at the Zebra3 Tea Shoppe, aka Zebra3 Teas, but it paid the bills and there had been one bright—literally bright—spot in his otherwise mediocre days: the mystery blond who came in every weekday and ordered the ethically-sourced, decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate. 

“The green chai tea?” sultry Vanessa always asked him, flirty and provocative. Dave wanted to tell him she was like that with every guy who came in, but there was never an opportunity. 

“Chai means tea,” the blond would say, his tone icy in a way Dave found really sexy. And she’d laugh. Probably he really liked her and would ask her out and they’d get married and live happily ever after someplace like Seattle. The blond looked like a Seattle kind of guy. 

Dave was sad because, invariably, when the mystery blond—whose name he still didn’t know even after two months because Vanessa always said, “Oh, I don’t need your name; I’ll never forget you,” to him, and drew a little smiling sun on his paper cup, and stroked his fingers when she handed it to him— 

Um. Whenever that happened, Dave would screw up the next couple of orders, daydreaming about the mystery blond whose name he would never know. 

And now it had happened one too many times. “Raspberry zinger with honey and whipped cream!” Mrs. Grossman had yelled. “Raspberry zinger with honey and whipped cream! How hard is that? How does this stupe always get it wrong? He always gives me wild berry zinger and half the time he forgets my whipped cream! I want a free drink! I want two free drinks and I want him fired!” 

Dave didn’t know if she got her free drinks, but he did know that he got fired. Harold Dobey had rolled his eyes and told him he was wasting product and pissing off the customers. “And what kind of job is this for a grown man?” he added. “You need to get a real career, make something of yourself. This is for your own good.” 

His own good. Well, maybe he had a point. He’d never even gotten his own nametag; Harold had just given him the one that belonged to the last guy, or maybe the one before that. Dave handed it in before he left. 

Harold gave him his last pay in cash and wished him luck. Vanessa smirked at him. Mrs. Grossman called him a putz and threatened to send her son to beat him up. 

Ken Hutchinson was upset. 

Fred, the cute, curly-haired guy wasn’t in the coffee shop when he went in the next morning. A different guy—albeit one who also had dark curly hair and who was also named Fred—made his order, and he made it wrong. “This is black chai,” Hutch said. 

Fred 2 shrugged. “It’s all tea,” he said. “That’s all we do here is tea.” 

Hutch took a sip. “This isn’t even decaffeinated.” 

Fred 2 shrugged again. “It all goes to the same place,” he said as though that made any sense. 

“Where is Fred?” Hutch asked. 

Fred 2 looked down at his nametag. “Looks like I’m Fred now.” 

Vanessa, the one who always flirted with him, said, “Oh, he got fired. This is our new Fred.” 

Now Hutch was confused. “What do you mean, your new Fred?” 

“Harold doesn’t bother with new name tags,” she explained, sounding annoyed with him. “He had a Fred and a Vanessa. Minnie had to buy her own. And my name is really Nancy.” She looked down at her name tag. “But I like Vanessa better anyway.” 

“Wait, you mean his name isn’t Fred?” He’d never find him again if he didn’t even know his first name! 

“No,” Vanessa/Nancy said, with exaggerated patience to show her impatience with him. “His name wasn’t Fred.” Her eyes were very narrow and she wasn’t flirting with him, she was sizing him up. “Why? What do you care what his name was?” 

“Give me my right order,” Hutch said. 

“It’s all tea,” Fred-who-probably-wasn’t-Fred-either said. 

“GIve the man his right order,” Harold said. He didn’t want to have to fire and hire more any more Freds this week. 

Vanessa/Nancy gave an impatient sigh. “Name?” she asked. 

“Ken,” Hutch said, giving her the name he used with strangers. 

Dave had had this fantasy, that one day he’d be on break and the mystery blond would come in and they’d talk and laugh and it would be romantic and fun. He’d seen this happen with Vanessa, and Minnie, the other barista, and even Harold. A tea shop seemed the be the perfect place to find love. Vanessa seemed to find it about twice a week. 

It wasn’t that he didn’t get flirted with. It was just that nobody had interested him before the blond. 

Only the mystery blond never came in during his break times, he came in right at six when they opened, and he didn’t stay and linger over his ethically-sourced decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate. He hurried off every time. And Dave didn’t know how to find him. 

Except that wasn’t really true. Dave didn’t know the blond’s name, but he knew he went to Zebra3 Teas every day at six. And while unemployed Dave couldn’t afford to buy anything there—and he didn’t even like tea, he liked coffee—he could still go there. Wait on the sidewalk. Maybe accidentally bump into the mystery blond as he came out. 

That’s what he would do. Tomorrow. Today he had job interviews. 

Hutch had had this fantasy. One day when he ordered his ethically-sourced decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate, it wouldn’t be Vanessa/Nancy who handed it to him, it would the cute curly-haired guy whose name wasn’t Fred. Their eyes would meet and Hutch would smile at him and he would smile at Hutch and they’d spark up a conversation that led to dinner that led to living happily ever after. Maybe in Seattle. Hutch had always wanted to live in Seattle. He’d heard they had the bluest skies you’ve ever seen there. But they couldn’t be bluer than Not-Fred's eyes. 

But now Not-Fred was gone and Hutch didn’t know how to find him. 

It was raining when Dave got to Zebra3 Teas. He didn’t go inside. In fact, he stood under the awning of the bakery on the other side of the street, eating a blintz. Buses and taxis came and went. Pedestrians hurried in or hurried past. None of them were the blond. Where was he? He was usually so prompt, sometimes arriving before they even officially opened. 

Dave watched until noon. His sneakers were soaked, his hair sproinged, and all over he had a glistening layer of rainwater as though he was a blade of grass after a heavy dew. 

And he was sneezing. Probably he was getting a cold. Unhappily, he trudged home. 

Hutch didn’t go back to Zebra3 Teas. He liked their tea, but it wasn’t really convenient; it was across town, so he had to transfer buses to get there, and he was usually a little late getting to class, which he hated. Hutch was a prompt kind of guy. 

There was a coffee shop around the corner, Brown Bear Coffee, which some people called Huggy’s Huggs. He knew they have decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate, though it might not be ethically-sourced. It was definitely more convenient, and while it didn’t have Not-Fred, neither did Zebra3. 

Dave had gotten a new job, anyway, even if he had lost the potential love of his life. It was at a coffee place, which was a better fit for him, and even though it was on the other side of town, there was a bus stop right outside the front door of Huggy’s Huggs. That was, Dave thought, a weird name for a coffee shop, but he’d heard worse. And the owner seemed like a good guy. He started Saturday, which wasn’t their busiest day, Mr. Brown told him, but it was the most fraught. 

“Weekdays, people come in, get their coffee, their tea, their almond milk, and they go, they’re in a hurry, they're on their way to work. Saturdays, they want a table, they want to sit and ponder, they want to hallucinate, they want to wander in their minds.” 

Dave was kind of wondering just what was in these drinks, if people were hallucinating, but he decided not to ask. His rent was due. 

He also decided not to drink anything but tap water while he was there. 

“They’re needy,” Mr. Brown continued. “You gotta pamper them, you gotta pander to them, you gotta give ‘em your snappy patter. You got snappy patter, my man?” 

“Sure,” Dave had assured him. He didn’t think he did, but what was the worst that could happen? Mr. Brown could fire him was all, and in the meantime, he’d be employed. 

The bigger problem was, he had three days until Saturday and all he could think about was the mysterious blond that got away. 

Only, he probably didn’t get away. He probably just wasn’t for Dave. Dave had seen the big books he carried with him; the blond was obviously really smart. He’d never have been interested in a guy like Dave, who poured coffee for a living. 

Hutch went to Huggy’s Huggs three times before he decided not to go back. For one thing, they didn’t know if their green chai was ethically-sourced. They didn’t know if anything they sold was ethically sourced. Rosey, the barista, had been sympathetic to his plight, and when the owner wasn’t around, she whispered to him, “It ‘falls off the back of a truck.’ It’s good, but it’s never the same stuff twice. Mr. Brown has friends.” 

And besides that, their pomegranate was dehydrated, and he was pretty sure the mint was peppermint. 

So, he’d have to find another place to get his ethically-sourced green chai with mint and pomegranate. 

But even if he did, it was unlikely he’d find Not-Fred, and even if he did, Hutch had to admit to himself that he probably wasn’t Not-Fred's type. Not-Fred was full of bouncy good spirits and he danced around while he was making the tea. Hutch couldn’t dance to save his life, and he tended to be . . . well, quiet. Nobody had ever called him the life of the party. Not-Fred would probably find him dull. 

“Where is that nice Fred you used to have here?” Mrs. Greene asked. She was Harold’s oldest customer—very old and very frail, but she came in every evening for her cup of sleepytime. 

“I had to let him go,” Harold told her. 

“Where did you get this Fred?” Mrs. Greene asked. “You should give him back. He gave me Lemon zinger yesterday and it kept me up all night. You need to get the other Fred back.” Mrs. Greene looked sharply at Fred. “What is in this cup?” 

“Tea,” Fred said. 

Mrs. Greene looked at Fred, looked at Harold, then dropped her cup on the floor. “If I want mystery drinks, I’ll go to Huggy’s Huggs,” she said, and walked out. 

Harold sighed and went to get the mop. She was right about this Fred—whose name was actually Nicky. Mrs. Grossman had thrown her cup at him and threatened him with her son, and Mrs. Pruitt had called him an idiot and demanded her money back. He was costing Harold a lot more than Dave had, and he’d only been there four days. 

Hutch hated rain, and winter in Bay City meant lots of rain. He was tired of trudging through the city, trying to find a new place that served ethically-sourced, decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate. He stopped even looking and just got himself a Sanka on campus. Maybe when spring came, he’d go back to Zebra3 Teas. 

Dave loved winter because winter meant Christmas, and Dave loved Christmas, even if it was grey and wet instead of cold and white. But he wasn’t feeling very jolly this year. He’d made some new friends though. Mr. Brown was kind of formal and a little weird, but the other baristas: Rosey, Gillian, and Helen were great. Huggy’s Huggs was a weird coffee shop, but Dave kind of liked it, even if his mysterious blond never came in. 

“Dammit!” Harold Dobey swore. He was on his fifth Fred. This one was named J.D. and Harold had thought he was a real catch because he’d stolen him away from Huggy’s Huggs. It was a lot more successful than Zebra3 Teas, and everybody knew why: their selection was more extensive and included things not on the menu. Harold never considered expanding his bill of fare that way, but he hoped having J.D. would help. J.D. was supposed to be a lot of fun. 

Zebra3 Teas had a much different clientele than Huggy’s Huggs. Harold’s regulars were mostly old ladies from the neighborhood. They had liked Dave’s upbeat personality. 

J.D. wasn’t really a Fred. He wouldn’t wear the nametag. And so far, he hadn’t been that much fun. Harold had the feeling that it was Brown’s extensive selection that had contributed to J.D.’s fun personality, and without it he was sluggish and down. 

That was bad enough, but this morning, Vanessa had quit. She’d been a pain in the ass, flirting, sometimes inappropriately, with all the male customers. But she’d also been pretty reliable, and she ingratiated herself to the old ladies. It was only for the tips, but she was so good at it, they had no idea. 

But now she had quit, leaving Harold short-handed. And she took the name tag with her. 

There was only one thing he could think to do. 

It was the day after Christmas, what they called Boxing Day in England. Dave didn’t know why they called it that. He read lots of trivia books, but that had never been covered in any of them. 

The day before the day before Christmas—what he’d used to call Christmas eve eve when he was a kid—he'd gotten a call from Harold, asking him if he wanted his job back. “I was wrong to fire you,” he said. “Everybody’s mad at me. Mr. and Mrs. Wilson and Mrs. Kates and Mrs. Turkel—even Mrs. Grossman. She told me if I didn’t get you back, she’d have her son beat me up!” 

Dave laughed. 

“Please, come back. We all miss you. Come for the Christmas party tomorrow and you can start back on the twenty-sixth. I’ll even pay you for Christmas!” 

Of course, Dave said yes. He brought Rosey with him to the party, and when Harold found out Rosey was looking for a new job, he hired her, too. Harold even got him a nametag with Dave on it, so he didn’t have to be a Fred anymore. Things were back the way they had been, only better. 

Except the mystery blond didn’t come in. 

Hutch slogged through the winter, focusing on his studies and making due with Sanka, trying not to think about Not-Fred. It was lonely, being in Bay City when his family was all in Minnesota. He had hoped to have met someone special by now. Maybe he had, but he’d let him get away. 

At last, spring came and classes ended. Hutch was still feeling down, but the delightful weather wouldn’t let him stay inside. He decided to treat himself to an ethically-sourced, decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate. 

It was later than he’d ever gone to Zebra3 Teas, nearly four in the afternoon, and unlike six in the morning, it was very quiet in the tea shoppe. Harold sat in a booth, reading the paper. A new barista, one he’d never seen before, was wiping down the counter. Behind her, a man was filling sugar dispensers and singing to himself. 

For a second, Hutch thought it was just not-Fred 2, but the hair was different, the face was cuter, the body was graceful in an almost feline way. It wasn’t not-Fred 2, it was his Not-Fred! 

Only, according to his nametag, he was Dave. Was that really his name, or was this just another weird in-joke? 

Hutch made his way quietly to the counter. The barista had gone to the back. Only Dave was there. Should he order, or should he say something more, should he—what should he do? 

Dave noticed him and a grin lit his face. “Get you something?” he asked. “Maybe an ethically-sourced, decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate?” 

Hutch was grinning too. “Yes, Dave, I’d love an ethically-sourced, decaffeinated green chai with mint and pomegranate.” 

“Could I have a name for the cup?” Dave asked. 

“Ken Hutchinson,” Hutch said. “But my friends call me Hutch.” 

Dave wrote Hutch on the cup, then added some hearts. When the tea was ready, he asked, “Is this to go, Hutch? I only ask because my break is past due. Maybe we could go across the street and get a couple of blintzes.” 

“I’m in no hurry,” Hutch said. And when Dave handed him his cup, Hutch deliberately stroked his fingers.

**Author's Note:**

> I asked for trope prompts to help me get out of my head and write something.


End file.
